Off Main Street: Beer and brawls at the Ralph
The offbeat side of the news
Updated: 05/03/08 9:18 AM
A debate over whether the Rogers Centre in Toronto or our own Ralph Wilson Stadium is the better football venue broke out in the letters page of the Toronto Sun this past week.
The Buffalo Bills plan to play eight games in the Rogers Centre over the next five years.
“The SkyDome — sorry, the Rogers Centre — is an ugly concrete monstrosity that is fine for baseball, but not for the best sport in the world, football,” Paul Senyk wrote in an April 26 letter, “Rogers is no Ralph.”
Senyk also praised Ralph Wilson Stadium as a place filled with “cool people” and the scene of “fun tailgating.”
This prompted a reply on Tuesday from Steve Campbell, who said that in 30-plus trips to the stadium in Orchard Park, fans have spilled beer on him, thrown up on him, and he’s seen more fights there than in his day job as a cop.
“I took my daughter to the Bills-Denver Broncos game last year and she found out from the drunken rowdy fan in front wearing a kilt that the legend as to what they wear under their kilts is true,” Campbell wrote.
Oh, that’s just wrong.
An honor worth toasting
Buffalo’s Anchor Bar is well-known as the acknowledged birthplace of the chicken wing.
Now the mainstay Main Street tavern is getting some international recognition as a place worth visiting to have a beer.
All About Beer magazine, an industry publication based in North Carolina, included the Anchor Bar on its recent “Growler List: 125 Places to Have a Beer Before You Die.”
The Anchor Bar is the only Buffalo representative on a list that touts establishments from Belgium, the United Kingdom, Germany, Jamaica, Australia and across the United States.
The Anchor Bar ranked No. 116 on a list topped by Denver’s Great American Beer Festival.
Commuters’ paradise
Ever been in one of those maddening four-minute morning traffic jams on the Kensington? Don’t you just go crazy when your ride to work takes 18 minutes instead of the usual 16 because that bozo in front of you refuses to go a mile over 55? Or how about the frustration of seeing people speed past you when the road ahead sign clearly says “Left Lane Closed”?
In spite of all the traffic headaches we put up with around here, Forbes magazine says Buffalo is the best city in the country for commuters.
“Local residents say you can drive between any two points in the Buffalo area in 20 minutes and based on our measures, it seems like a reasonable notion,” the magazine said, noting that the region’s infrastructure is designed to handle a much larger population.
By the way, the worst commuter cities, according to Forbes, are Atlanta, Detroit and Miami.
Sure. But drivers there have never had to deal with one of those ridiculous eight car back-ups on the 400.
G-man who likes rock
Not many people would expect to find an FBI agent in the role of a rock concert promoter.
But they don’t know about Buffalo FBI Special Agent Bill Fallon and his longtime relationship with his favorite rock band, Southside Johnny and the Asbury Jukes.
Fallon is Buffalo chapter representative of the FBI Agents Association, which raises money to help the children of deceased agents with college costs.
The association is sponsoring a fundraising concert, starting at 2 p. m. May 24 in Club Infinity, 8166 Main St., Amherst.
The Jukes, a legendary New Jersey-based rock band, will headline, with six local bands also appearing.
Fallon, 46, is friendly with a couple of the band members and has seen them in concert at least 30 times “from Manhattan to San Diego.”
“I love the Jukes, and I probably drive my wife crazy,” Fallon said. “This event is going to be fun, but the main purpose is to benefit a very good cause.”
Ticket information is available at Club Infinity, 565-0110.
